


something gave you the nerve to touch my hand

by professortennant



Category: Bon Appétit Test Kitchen RPF, Chef RPF
Genre: Camping, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Stress Relief
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-20
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2020-10-24 12:54:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 20,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20706323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/professortennant/pseuds/professortennant
Summary: Claire has been more than a little stressed, as of late. Brad can see it: the dark circles beneath her eyes, the unfocused way her eyes dart around the test kitchen, the way she struggles to follow conversations.It's up to him to make sure his favorite pastry chef relaxes.Which is the only explanation he can offer for why he blurts out the suggestion that Claire come camping with him this weekend.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> this is ~roughly~ set around doughnuts part 1 because poor baby claire looks exhausted. after i read that claire likes to go fly fishing, it just felt natural that she'd be down to camp, too. and well, we know how brad feels about camping and the outdoors. cue a few chapters of these idiots going camping and realizing that out in the woods....anything can happen.

The general perception in the kitchen is that Brad’s a pretty unflappable guy. Blindly optimistic, cheerful, an uncanny ability to roll with the punches and adapt to any situation, and a stature that naturally lent itself to leadership, he’d been a natural choice for kitchen manager. Later, after _It’s Alive_ and other duties had pulled him away from that role, he’d still managed to be a notable figure in the kitchen.

Stress just rolled off him like water off a duck’s back. 

But if stress rolled off his back, it clung to Claire Saffitz, permeating her being and settling beneath her skin. Brad had always liked the energy Claire brought to the kitchen. She’d been a dose of serious focus in a mostly chaotic, disorganized kitchen. To his delight, though, he’d found out she had as quirky a sense of humor as he did, quick to giggle and laugh and get silly. 

In those early days, after misconceptions about what it meant to be a Harvard girl and a New Jersey boy had been dispelled, they had found a certain rhythm, camaraderie, and friendship working on back-to-back stations. She’d learned that he preferred to just play music straight out of his phone, headphones be damned, and always started his day with some bizarre concoction of tea, tinctures, and herbs. 

“Claire,” he’d deadpanned when she’d stared at him in disbelief that he _hated_ coffee. “Can you imagine _me_ on coffee? Christ, you’d murder me.” They’d laughed and she’d nodded along, unable to deny it. Brad was a ball of energy that frequently overwhelmed her introverted tendencies. 

But he’d learned when she’d hit a boundary, when the kitchen was too loud, too smelly, too overwhelming. He wasn’t unaware when he was being a little _too_ in her space, a little too involved and babbling in her ear. But he knew when she had enough when she went quiet and her brow creased and she started huffing and sighing, tilting her head from side to side to crack her neck, rolling her shoulders back.

When Claire went quiet, it was time to give her space to breathe and get herself together. And food. Always have food at the ready at any given moment.

(His kitchen cubby was stuffed with snacks for her and his phone was filled with food delivery apps that he only ever used for her.)

Managing stress—his own and Claire’s—had fallen onto his shoulders and it was a job he took on proudly. It felt like a super power: he was in charge of keeping Claire sane and only he knew how. 

But over the last few months, as _Gourmet Makes_ really took off, as book deals and journalists and fans—honest to god _fans_—had come a’ callin’, he’d also seen her stress levels reach untenable levels. He’d tried talking to the higher authorities within the kitchen about the ridiculous shit they made her do (“C’mon, Matt. Fuckin’ Starbursts? Give her a break.”), but he’d been told emphatically that the stress is what drove the viewership higher and Claire hadn’t complained, not really, so they had no plans to change anything.

Brad had to bite back an uncharacteristically sharp retort that if they knew Claire at all, they’d know she’d never ask for leniency or hint that she couldn’t handle it. Stubborn Harvard perfectionist. 

So Brad watched her like a hawk, ready to do whatever song and dance was required to give her a moment of reprieve. It had been the genesis of sourdough doughnuts. If there was one thing he knew about Claire, is that she _loved_ making bread—especially sourdough—and she _loved_ telling him what to do. It was just convenient for them both that Brad was happy to go along with whatever she said. 

Hunzi had smiled knowingly at him from over the top of the camera as he made sure he and Claire talked about everything under the sun _except_ doughnuts and sourdough and starter. All that mattered was that Claire was laughing the kind of laugh that made her eyes crinkle. 

(The teasing her hair with the Cambro lid hadn’t been strictly necessary, he supposed. Well, nothing about this video had been _strictly _necessary. But he’d left a very happy Claire with a giant bowl of salad and a little less stress. Mission accomplished.)

Except when he’d returned a few hours later, her hair was falling out of its messy bun and her cheeks were flushed, and there were dark circles under her eyes. She’d struggled the last half of the episode, unfocused and distracted, eyes darting between her phone (he saw email notifications and Instagram notifications and text messages lighting the screen up).

He knew things were dire when Hunzi had clearly stated which episode came out first and she completely blacked out and got mixed up, looking up at him with manic eyes and slumping against the countertop.Still, those dark circles beneath her eyes haunted him and he knew things were dire. This was way beyond stressed Claire. This was a Claire breaking apart at the seams. 

After she’d zoned out in the walk-in and been scared by Hunzi of all people, he knew he needed to step in. This wasn’t the Claire he knew and he was clearly falling down on the job as her (self-appointed) protector if it had gotten to this point. 

“Yo, Hunzi! Give me and Claire five, okay? And then we’ll wrap up on post, yeah?”

Hunzi waved at him, head down and fiddling with the settings on his camera. Claire sighed and shook her head. 

“Brad, I _can’t_ take five. I’ve got to figure out these Starbursts. I mean, something is just _wrong. _The sugar isn’t cooking the way it should and—“

But Brad wasn’t listening, instead tugging at the ties of her apron insistently. She laughed and batted his hands away from her apron. It made him smile and helped distract him from the fact that he was tugging at her apron and demanding she take it off—something he’d have been happy to do under entirely different circumstances if she ever gave him an indication that she’d be interested in. 

“_Fine,”_ she relented, rolling her eyes at him. “Five minutes.”

While Claire shrugged out of her apron, Brad grabbed her near-empty iced coffee cup and topped it up with the cold brew he kept for her in his section of the reach-in. Her soft, pleased expression when he handed her the refreshed drink was worth the extra money he spent each month to keep her happy. 

With a hand at the small of her back, hovering not pushing, he guided her out the kitchen, down the elevator, through the lobby, and out the wide bay of doors of the World Trade Center. 

“What—Brad, where are we going?”

“Just trust me, Claire.”

She bumps his shoulder with hers (well, the part of his shoulder he can reach that is) and tucks her hair behind her ear, sipping at her iced coffee. “I do.” 

It makes his steps falter, the sincere tone of her voice, and he looks down at her, surprised. But she’s looking stoically ahead, like if she doesn’t look directly at him the words won’t count. He bites back a grin and lets her have her escape. 

In a few short blocks, they’re on the outskirts of Central Park and settling onto a park bench beside a fountain, a family of ducklings swimming in a row along the edge. It was one of his favorite spots in New York. If he closed his eyes and took deep breaths, he could almost imagine he was outside the city, the noise and pollution and people and claustrophobic buildings falling away. 

“Brad—“

“Sh.”

“_Brad—“_

_“Sh.”_ This time more forcefully.

He cracked open an eye and saw her gritting her teeth, barely biting back the urge to push and keep talking. With a deep, dramatic inhale and exhale, he relaxed his shoulders and turned to her, propping his knee up on the bench so it was pressed against her thigh. 

“You, Miss Saffitz, are stressed to all hell. Ah, ah, ah!” He pointed a finger at her, hushing her protests. “Just listen for a second, okay? I know you want to pretend like you’re the freakin’ pastry queen and that you thrive on stress or whatever.” He dropped his voice, reaching out for her and resting a big hand on her shoulder. “But Claire, you can’t keep at it like this.”

Predictably, she denied it all outright. “Brad, I appreciate your concern, really, but I’m _fine.”_

“Claire, look who you’re talkin’ to here. It’s _me. _C’mon.”

For a moment, he thought she was going to protest further, shake her head and tell him to mind his business and that she really was _fine._ But then he watched the fight go out of her. She slumped back against the bench, eyes closed, and jaw tight and strained like she was trying to keep everything in. 

He squeezed her shoulder softly, offering what support he could. And then she cracked, chin wobbling and she turned her big brown eyes onto him, shining with the sheen of tears born of stress and exhaustion. Brad fought the urge to cup her face in his hand, stroke his thumb beneath her eye and catch the tear before it could fall. 

“God, Brad, I just—It’s all happening so fast. I don’t even know where to start.” Her voice cracks and his heart cracks right along with it. A few fat tears slip down her cheek and she wipes away at them, almost angrily and embarrassed. 

“There are people who want to know what I’m doing and what I’m wearing and my Instagram never stops beeping at me and the _emails_. And I’m writing this book and I barely have any time to recipe test the way I want to with the shooting schedule the way it is—“

He considers interrupting her, but she seems like she’s on a roll now, letting the dam break inside of her and letting everything come out in a rush. He just keeps his hand on her shoulder, occasionally squeezing gently in support and keeping up a steady brush of his thumb against her neck. 

“And I don’t _want_ to give up Gourmet Makes. It’s—God, it’s so fucking frustrating but it’s _fun._ I know it doesn’t look like it, but it’s like a puzzle for my brain and I like it. But they’re getting harder and harder and I can’t sleep and I keep—I keep—“ Her voice cracks again and this time she can’t swallow back the sob, the one built of stress. “I keep _failing.”_

At this, Brad cracks, too. He tugs her gently forward, tucks her against his body and shushes her gently, cups the back of her head and strokes her hair as she cries against his shoulder, sniffling and snuffling into the worn plaid fabric. He murmurs nonsensical things in her ear, tells her it’s alright and it’ll be okay and to just let it out. 

When the sniffling subsides, she pulls back and wipes messily at her face with the back of her hand, smearing her mascara and looking up at him through wet eyelashes, cheeks flushed. “I’m sorry,” she murmurs. “I just—I’ve been so tired lately and I got your shirt all wet.”

She brushes half-heartedly at his shoulder where her tears have left a stain. Brad doesn’t care. She could have blown her nose into his shirt and he would have offered her the other side if she wanted it. 

“You can cry on my shirt any time, Saffitz,” he tells he softly, forcing himself to speak evenly and softly. He can feel the laundry list of reasons he thinks she’s perfect bubbling up in his throat, but it feels like it might be tipping his hand if he started gushing now. 

“Listen to me, Claire. You’re _not_ a failure. You think just anyone can walk into that kitchen and do what you do? What you do is incredible. _You’re_ incredible.”

_Okay_, Brad thought to himself, panicked, _drifting into gush territory. Rein it in. _

He cleared his throat. “What I’m saying is, you need to give yourself a break. You’re a goddamn rising star, Claire. We all knew it. It’s just time for you to, you know, rise.”

She laughs softly at this, blushes and ducks her head. “Brad…”

And he can feel it now, the super power of his to protect her and manage her, rising up within him. He lets his fingertips drift down her shoulder, over her elbow and forearm, before withdrawing back into his lap.

“But you gotta take care of yourself, Claire. You’re running yourself ragged and you’re no good to anyone all zombie-fied.” The Bradism earns him a quirk of her mouth and he takes it as a win.

“I don’t know how to relax anymore,” she confesses, eyes focusing on the ducklings ahead of her. “Baking used to be it but now…I don’t know anymore.”

The hopelessness in her voice breaks his heart and he wonders how she got to this point without anyone—without _him_—noticing. She falls back against the bench, eyes fluttering closed and breathing deeply. 

“Actually,” she adds, turning her head, lolling to the side to look at him with a soft expression on her face. “This is probably the most relaxed I’ve been in a while. I forgot how much I loved this part of the park.”

It came to him then, like all of his good ideas: on pure instinct born of circumstance and gut feeling. Claire sat before him, haloed by sunlight and framed by tall, verdurous trees, the whistling of birds and the rustling of wind filling the air. 

He knew _exactly_ what she needed.

“Come camping with me,” he said before he could talk himself out of it. She looked startled at his words and she stared at him, mouth agape. He forged on ahead, barreling through the awkwardness. This was a good idea. He just knew it.

“Look, I was plannin’ on goin’ campin’ this weekend, get some fresh air, man make fire, maybe go fishin, the whole nine yards. And a guy could use some company of one of his very best and dearest friends who _also_ happens to need some R&R.”

He put on his best puppy dog expression, the one that he knew made her bend to the point of breaking and going along with whatever ridiculous idea he had—like compressed sugar and three-day old koji shrimp. Claire hesitated and it was incredible to watch her overthink and dissect the request in the span of a few minutes, eyes darting back and forth and searching. 

“This weekend?” she finally asked, voice uncharacteristically shy. 

Warmth and excitement bloomed in his chest and he grinned, nodding. “You bet, Half-Sour. I’ll pick ya up Friday morning and we’ll be back Monday morning, no problemo.” 

“Okay, I’m in,” she agreed, looking a little surprised and unsure at her answer. And then she grinned and nudged his knee with hers. “But on one condition.” A pause and then. “I’m in charge of the music.”

He barked out a laugh and nodded, clapping his hands and pointing at her, making her laugh. “You got it, Claire! You got it!’

She bit her lip and played with the plastic straw of her iced coffee, twirling it absentmindedly between her fingers. But he knew he had her, knew that in a few days they’d be on their way in his truck to upstate New York. He would make her relax, help her patch up the cracks that had found their way into his favorite pastry chef’s life.

Pushing up from the bench, he dusted his hands off on his jeans and offered his hand to her with a dramatic flourish. “Shall we return to the ole test kitchen?”

Her hand slipped into his easily, his larger hand engulfing her smaller one, as she allowed him to help her up off the Central Park bench and begin their walk back to the World Trade Center. If he didn’t necessarily let go of her hand as fast as he could have, well, that was just for him to know.

It didn’t matter that Rapoport gave him shit about shooting schedule delays and not taking breaks in the middle of the day. 

He and Claire were going camping together and that was all that mattered. 


	2. Chapter 2

The sun was just creeping over the city’s horizons and peeking out from behind buildings when Brad pulled his big truck up in front of Claire’s apartment building. The bed of the truck was packed with his duffel bag, his favorite single-person tent, and a few coolers’ worth of beer, bottled water, and food: steaks and shrimp and fresh vegetables. Camping with Brad wasn’t just for a video, after all, and this certainly wasn’t his first rodeo. 

Besides, he wanted this weekend to be _perfect._ Claire had texted him a few dozen times the previous night to pepper him with questions about what she needed to bring, what she could help pay for, and did he think the sourdough dough they’d left fermenting over the weekend would be okay. It had given him great pleasure to reply exclusively in emojis and those little moving pictures (he was pretty sure Andy called them gifs or some shit). 

_Brad!_ had been her returned text many times and he could sense her growing frustration and panic through the phone. The plan was to help Claire relax, not wind her up. She was always so worried about making sure she was pulling her weight and contributing. It gave him a little bit of a thrill to think about taking care of her this weekend. He shook his head fondly and typed a reply back. 

_Claire, relax. I got it covered. Just need your stuff and you. Pick u up at 6._

His phone pinged almost immediately with a notification from her. _In the morning??_

_Uh, yeah, Claire!_

_I hate you._

He’d sent her back a string of emojis, tents and smiley faces and suns and thumbs ups. This was going to be the best weekend ever: camping and cooking and Claire.

Pushing his sunglasses up onto his head, he hopped out of the truck and made his way through the apartment lobby, nodding at Claire’s doorman, Max, who bumped fists with Brad in greeting. Brad liked ole Max, who had puffed out his chest and asked Brad Twenty Questions the first time he’d come to Claire’s apartment, making sure he was alright and safe to be anywhere near Claire.

He hadn’t taken any offense. Brad had felt better knowing Max was standing guard. Claire was just the kind of gal who inspired a protective streak. 

When he knocked on Claire’s door at six sharp and the door opened, he was met with a bleary-eyed Claire who was clutching her glass of cold brew like a lifeline. 

“You’re a menace to society,” she greeted with a grumpy edge to her voice, widening the door and allowing him to step through into her apartment. “Six in the morning isn’t even a time that exists in my world, I hope you know. “

Brad bounded after her, wide awake and eager to hit the road. He clapped his hands and rubbed them together, much to her distaste. “Let’s go, Claire! The road waits for no one!”

“It literally does, though. It could wait a few hours.”

“Okay, okay, fine. _I_ can’t wait. Claire, c’mon, let’s go.” He let the last few syllables drag out in a childish, playful whine, stamping his feet impatiently. Brad saw her roll her eyes and her lips twitch in a smile as she downed the last of her coffee and wiped a hand over her mouth, turning to face him. 

“You packed everything, right?”

“_Yes_, Claire.”

“And s’mores? Because you can’t have a campfire without s’mores. It’s like, a requirement.”

He looked at her with a deadpan expression, almost insulted. “They were the first things I packed.”

“And you remembered the extra fishing rod for me? Because if you didn’t, we can just swing by the storage unit and grab mine and—“

“_Claire.”_

“Okay, okay,” she said, holding her hands up in surrender. She shot him a nervous grin. “Sorry, I just—I’m not used to someone else taking care of everything.”

He shrugged his shoulders bashfully and reached for her duffel bags and small cooler by the front door, slinging them over his shoulder and ignoring her protests that she could carry her own stuff just fine. 

“Yeah, well, this is step one of the Brad Leone Relaxation Routine: No decision making.”

She flicked the lights off in her apartment, grabbed her personal backpack and sunglasses, and ushered them out, locking up her apartment behind her. The hallways of her apartment were fairly narrow and with the added width of her things on his shoulder, they found themselves pressed closer together than normal, their shoulders bumping together. 

“Oh yeah? Tell me more about this famous Leone Relaxation Routine,” she teased, looking up at him with wide eyes. Brad glanced at her thoughtfully. He liked the way she looked at him, liked the way that even when they were being a little silly, she focused her attention entirely on him as if what he had to say was incredibly important. It made _him_ feel important. 

He regaled her with his multi-step relaxation plan as they made their way down the stairs and out to his truck, her bags still slung over his shoulder. 

“We’re turning our phones off—“

“Oh, Brad. No. I can’t—“

“We’re turning our phones off,” he stressed to her once more, pushing open the door and holding it open for her, escorting her out into the busy New York street and towards his truck. He threw her bags into the back of his truck, her duffel and cooler fitting in nicely among his things in a way that made his chest feel tight and warm. He turned to face her and leaned against the truck, grinning brightly as if his optimism was competing with the bright sun. She was staring at him with an inscrutable expression, brow furrowed with the little crease between her eyes that always made him want to smooth it away with the pad of his fingers. 

“Let’s go,” he said, instead choosing to reach out and slide her sunglasses down from where they perched atop her head down to settle over her nose. “There’s a present for you in the front.”

She perked up at the mention of a present and she made her way to the front of the cab, sliding in and making herself comfortable, slipping her personal backpack between her legs. Brad clamored in next to her, putting on his own sunglasses and adjusting his baseball cap. 

“Oh, _Brad.” _

The white paper bag in her hand was ripped open and the aroma of hot and fresh cardamom and orange cinnamon rolls from her favorite bakery down the street filled the cab of the truck. In the cupholders sat an iced coffee for her and a small black coffee for him. 

Claire dug into the confection with abandon, ripping the dough and stuffing it into her mouth, fingertips and all and sighed happily, falling back against her seat and turning to face him, head lolling to the side as she chewed. “This is my favorite thing in the world.”

He rolled his eyes. “Yeah, I _know_, Claire.”

When the bakery had opened, Claire would not stop talking about their pastries and breads, raving about gluten formation and crumb structure and crystalline formation in their sugar glazes. Amiel and Delany had grabbed their coffees and escaped her wide-eyed enthusiasm, but Brad had settled in, pulling up a chair and resting his chin in his hands as he listened to her rant and rave about the beauty of baking. 

There was something magical about her when she talked about things she loved, things she was passionate about. It made him feel her passion, too. It made him feel close to her. 

Her gasp of surprise brought his attention back to her and he watched as she reached for her iced coffee and slurped some of it down like it was the elixir of life. He wished he could see her eyes behind her sunglasses when she turned in her seat and beamed at him, coffee and pastry in hand. 

“Brad, I take back everything bad I’ve ever said about you. You’re a hero.”

This made him bark with laughter and he turned the key of the engine and the truck roared to life as he pulled out into the street and headed for the highways and the open road towards the campgrounds. 

__________________

When he had offered for her to come along with him this weekend, he hadn’t done so with much thought. He liked being around Claire and liked the way their energies meshed. She was in need and he had a solution: a little sunshine, some fresh air, and a couple of campfire s’mores. Claire would feel better in no time.

What he hadn’t counted on was how her presence would affect _him_. Because he certainly accounted for how her bare feet on his dashboard tapping along to the beat of the Springsteen sound blaring through the speakers would impact him. 

(Her toes were painted a bright, shocking shade of electric purple that highlighted how delicate and pale her toes were. The sight had made his mouth go dry and he carefully filed the knowledge away in the growing list of things he knew about her.)

And he _definitely_ hadn’t accounted for her fingers twitching at her side like she was itching to play air guitar and for her frankly terrible singing voice. 

He should have known it all would have helped paint a more complete picture of Claire Saffitz that warmed him all the way to his boot-clad toes. 

“C’mon, Claire,” he said excitedly, reaching out to crank up the music and then rolling down the window so the wind cut through the cab. He leaned his head back and yowled along with the music, taking his hands off the wheel for a quick air drum solo. 

Beside him, Claire laughed at his antics, pushing a hand up in her hair to stop it from whipping around her face. And still, her toes tapped and her fingers itched like they just needed one more push. 

Brad leaned his head back and belted the lyrics out at the top of his lungs and then turned to her. “Claire! Claire, c’mon, guitar solo!”

She bit her lip in hesitation before sitting up in the chair and rocking out alongside him, her hands and fingers pretending to dance along the strings and frets of an imaginary guitar. Their voices mingled together as they sung about America and the working class and working hard and being successful. 

In the middle of the song, Brad looked over and took in the sight of her: head thrown back, hair falling out of her bun and whipping around her face, the sun warming her cheeks. She was the picture of carefree perfection. 

He turned the music up louder and breathed through the rush of contentment that filled his lungs. 

__________________

An hour and a half and a few Spotify playlists later (“_Really_, Claire? Broadway music?” “Brad! We live in New York!” “And I’ve never seen a single musical, thank you very much.” “Oh, we are so fixing that when we get back.”), his truck was parked in front of their camp grounds and they were working in tandem to unload the truck and get their supplies organized. 

In a lot of ways, it felt like they were in the kitchen. Though they’d never been in this situation before, they both worked together quickly and efficiently. She left the heavy-lifting to Brad who pulled the full coolers off the back of the truck easily. Claire worked on clearing out the fire pit in the center of their campground and then looking around the site for kindling and tinder and firewood. 

When she returned with an armful of wood, she knelt down and set about carefully organizing it into piles so they could easily set up and fuel their fire. She looked up to see Brad expertly clearing out a smooth patch of ground for the tent, then easily sliding the tent from its slipcover and snapping the support poles into place.

He must have sensed her eyes on him because he looked up from what he was doing and grinned at her. 

“What?”

“Just thinking how much you ham it up for the camera sometimes.”

He cocks his head to the side, finishing up pinning the fabric over the support poles. “Claire, I have no idea what you’re talking about.” But his eyes are sparkling mischievously, betraying the truth of the matter. 

“I just think you seem to have come a long way in your tent skills since your camping video.”

“Claire,” he says with a dramatic flourish, leaving the perfectly erect tent behind him and stepping towards her with a hand over his heart, batting his eyelashes at her. “Are you saying you watch my videos?”

She blushes and ducks her head, suddenly very interested in finishing stacking her firewood and moving on to organizing the giant plastic tubs holding their fishing lures. 

“What? No. I—Vinny! Vinny was tellin’ me about it.”

But it’s too late now. He can see through her on the best of days and she’s a truly horrible liar. Everything she thinks and feels plays out on her face, rendering her incapable of hiding anything. Because it was true, she _had_ watched his videos. All of them. He’d come so damn far from that first kombucha video and she was inordinately proud of him. _It’s Alive_ had taken on a life of its own, a life Brad had breathed into it. 

One day, she’d tell him that on her lowest days, when she was feeling stressed to hell and a little needy, she put his videos on as background noise. With his voice filling her apartment, it was almost like he was there with her. 

Brad leaned against one of the plastic tubs, chin on his crossed arms, grinning knowingly at her. “Uh-huh,_ sure_, Claire. Ole Vincenzo _does_ have a motor mouth. Never stops talking.”

She throws a fishing lure at his head with a playful glare. “Shut up.”

__________________

“Um, Brad? Where’s my tent?”

Brad looked over at his companion from where he was kneeling by the stack of kindling in the center of the fire pit, blowing softly to help fan the spark into a roaring flame. Satisfied with the tiny fire that would flicker into a beast in no time after it ate up the kindling and firewood he tossed on it. 

He stood and brushed his hands on his thighs. “What do you mean? I thought you grabbed it when we left your place?”

She stared at him, eyes sparking fiercely. “_No,_” she said slowly, hands coming to rest on her hips. “You said we you were grabbing everything.”

He blinked at her, a sort of uncomfortable dread filling him. “Oh. Oh no, Claire. I’m _sorry._ I got distracted with the Leone Rules of Relaxation and completely forgot it.”

The emotions that played across Claire’s face was terrifying: frustration, anger, panic, and then, as she exhaled slowly, resignation. Her eyes darted from the single-person tent he had set up to him and then back to the tent. 

He cleared his throat nervously and laughed, hoping to ease some of the tension. “Well, I mean, it’s a one-person, but there’s plenty of room for two. We’ll throw your sleeping bag in there and just, y’know—“ He made an awkward gesture with his hands, fingers entwining. They seemed to realize what that gesture was actually implying at the same time and he felt his eyes go wide with embarrassment before awkwardly dropping his hands at his side.

“Share?” she croaked, licking her lips. “With you?”

“Well, it’s either me or the bears, Claire! Heh, heh, I know I’ve got a bear thing going right now.” He strokes his scruffy beard and grins. “But I’m much less dangerous.”

Claire closed her eyes and breathed deeply, trying to quell the rising butterflies of panic and excitement. She was anxious to share such close quarters with him. On her best days she was needy for him, needed his praise and guidance and support. These were not her best days. Her nerves were frayed and she felt open and exposed. He could see through her on most days. It felt like she was transparent, only a few moments away from collapsing like a house of cards and telling him _everything._

In a single-person tent, there would be no hiding from him, from her feelings that were growing rapidly out of her control. 

Besides, it was only for the weekend. Three nights.

She’d been controlling herself around him for this long, reigning herself in as best she could.

She could handle three nights.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chap was kinda a slog to get through BUT i promise the next few chapters are gonna be lit.


	3. Chapter 3

The rest of the day is spent doing the hard work of setting up camp for a long weekend. Claire didn’t have time to panic and work herself up, anxiety and all, over the prospect of sharing a tent with him all weekend, not when she was busy stacking tubs of supplies, unfolding camping chairs, and poring over the campground maps in search of the best trail to start on. 

Growing up in the midwest, she had loved camping and fishing and getting herself a little dirty. There were many fond memories of her family gathered around the campfire with marshmallows on the end of their sticks, her sister pushing her into the lake while canoeing, sitting on the edge of a rock face at the end of the trail and watching the sun set over the grounds. 

Central Park was a pretty incredible feat—towering trees and luscious green grass tucked away in the middle of the nation’s largest concrete jungle. She’d contented herself with the winding trails of Central Park, but now, out here in the middle of the Catskills with the true beauty of nature surrounding her, she’s not sure how she ever contented herself with anything less. 

She took a deep breath, let the cool, crisp air fill her lungs, and exhaled slowly. Out here, away from the bustle of the city and the nonstop stream of noise and distractions, she felt her mind start to finally calm and settle. The anxiety and stress of the last few months was still there in her chest, but it felt soothed and eased now. 

Brad’s merry whistling drew her attention and she found herself smiling without conscious thought. There was something so dangerously, effortlessly easy about being here with him. She’d worried that, despite their friendship, the weekend would be awkward. But Brad seemed to just _know_ when Claire needed space to work quietly on her own and when she needed him. And he never seemed upset when she held up her hand and told him to leave her alone, just took it on the chin and backed away slowly and waited for her to come back to him. 

Like she always did. 

They’d eaten peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and munched on sour salt and vinegar chips and studiously ignored the single tent erected at the back of their campground.

Brad had bopped around the fire earlier in the day, adjusting wood and coals to create varying pockets of heat, talking to himself under his breath, making nonsensical noises that filled the empty air between the trees. “Oh, _yeah_, Claire. Oh this is workin’ out real nice. Woo! Can you feel that heat? We’re movin’, we’re groovin’. We’ll be grillin’ up steaks tonight in no time!”

She had laughed, popped the last of the chip into her mouth and adjusted her sunglasses on the bridge of her nose. “And what are we going to do in the meantime, huh? We got a lot of time to kill between now and dinner.”

_And bedtime, _her brain supplied unhelpfully. Her heart picked up speed as her mind flickered to sleeping bags stacked atop each other, his legs pressed and curved behind hers, his warmth filling the tent and—

She shook her head to stop her thoughts from wandering and watched with interest as Brad carried over a plastic tub and plopped it down between them. Clearly labeled on the side of the container, his messy handwriting scribbled over painter’s tape, was _Crafts for Claire!_

“Brad, what is that?”

He beamed at her, clapped his hands together, and rubbed them excitedly, practically vibrating in his chair, knees bouncing. “Okay, so I swung by that store you like, uh—Michelle’s? No, no! Michael’s! And I—well, I didn’t really know _what_ kind of crafts and shit you liked to do, so I asked around for the best kinds of crafts for camping and this lady was _super_ helpful and told me what to get. I mean, look at this, Claire!”

She peered inside the tub and had to cover her mouth to stop herself from laughing. It looked like Brad had raided the children’s section of the craft store. There were bags and bags of pipe cleaners, coloring books and crayons, glitter and glitter glue, pom-poms and googly eyes.

“Um, Brad, did you tell the salesperson that there were only _adults_ camping this weekend?”

He blinked at that, looked down at the tub of brightly colored materials and back to Claire’s face where she was struggling to hide her growing smile and the laughter bubbling up in the back of her throat.

“Ohhh. I see. Yeah, no, I know. That is making sense now.”

Claire couldn’t help herself, then. She burst into laughter, Brad’s own guffaws joining hers. Tears welled up in her eyes from her giggles and she wiped at them, catching her breath.

“Brad, what did you think we were going to make with this?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know, Claire. I just know you like crafting and shit. It was supposed to help you relax.” Her heart fluttered and warmed in her chest at that, a wave of gratitude for him filling her. He continued, “Besides, I think the lady said something about pinecone people?”

She nodded, knowing exactly what he was referring to. Standing from her chair, she gathered their trash and empty beer and water bottles, and put them in bear-proof trash canisters he’d brought along. She nudged his boot with hers and grinned.

“Then let’s go get some pinecones.”

He wasn’t wrong. She _did_ love arts and crafts—even if the crafts were meant for five year olds. As far as she was concerned, there was no age limit on a good time. 

____________________

After about fifteen minutes of searching the nearby area, they returned to the campsite with armfuls of pinecones. As they assembled their pinecone people, Claire found herself relaxing more than she had in the last few months. As she meticulously glued on googly eyes and brightly colored, fuzzy pom-poms, and wove the piper cleaners among the woody scales, twisting them into approximations of arms, Brad regaled her with stories about living on a farmhouse and the crazy shenanigans he got up to in his wild days.

“You say wild days like that’s your past. I’ve seen what you get up to on the weekends,” she teased, tongue peeking out from the corner of her mouth in concentration as she dotted the googly eye trying to make an escape with some reinforcement glitter glue. 

“I’m the picture of innocence, Saffitz.”

She huffed in disbelief, thought about pressing him about the baggy of pre-rolled spliffs she knew was tucked into the front of his backpack and working up the courage to ask for one, but let the moment pass. There would be plenty of time for that tomorrow. 

Her cone person was bright and merry and absolutely, deliriously delightful. She grabbed her phone out of her back pocket, arranged the cone person just so by the fire, and snapped a picture. In some ways, she was more proud of this child’s craft than she was of any Twixie bar she’d made. 

“Okay, I’m letting that phone usage go because it was for very important documentation purposes, but I mean it, Claire! No phone! It’s just going to distract you and spike your blood pressure again and—Are you even listening to me?”

She looked up guiltily from her phone. On the screen, her email app was open and her thumb was hovering over a message from Rapo about shoot reschedules. She hadn’t even remembered opening the email; it was just instinct, like she was some addict. 

Brad made a grab for her phone but she turned away, clutching it to her chest. “No, no. Okay, I’m sorry. Look it’s going away.” She tucked it back into her back pocket and stuck her tongue out at him. 

“Ah, jeez. Can’t take you anywhere, Claire. _Very_ immature.” He picked up her pine cone person and his (which, she noticed, had three curly, green pipe cleaner arms, pom-poms for eyes, and he’d fashioned a tiny hat out of the glittery construction paper). 

“What—Where are you going?”

Brad was heading for the tent and Claire sent a panicked look to the darkening sky, the sun setting behind the trees. Evening was settling in but it surely wasn’t time for bed yet. Her heart raced again at the thought of what was fast approaching. 

“I gotta put our new cone friends somewhere safe!”

He ducked down by the tent for a moment, but Claire couldn’t see what he was doing. What she _could_ see, though, was the wide expanse of Brad’s shoulders and the way his pants pulled tight over his backside. Her mouth went dry, but she couldn’t tear her eyes away until he stood and spun back towards her, proud of himself. She schooled her features back into what she hoped was an innocent expression. 

“Check it out!”

Claire squinted through the rapidly falling darkness and found their pine cones propped up against the base of their tent. And then she saw it: their tiny pipe cleaner hands were entwined, leaning against each other. To her embarrassment—and really, the universe was out for her this weekend—even the googly eyes of Claire’s pine cone were tilted to the side in the direction of the Brad cone. 

She licked her lips and looked back at Brad who was watching her. There was _something_ there on his face, illuminated by the crackling fire that made her pause. His eyes were dark and focused on her. Normally, Brad’s eyes darted all over the place when he was talking to her, flicking from the thing going on over her shoulder, to the camera, to the thing in his hand or the thing in hers, and basically taking in every possible stimuli in the room. 

But now? It felt like he was saying something and waiting for her to hear it. It felt like she caught him in a moment, in a look, she wasn’t supposed to. She swallowed against the lump of emotions in her throat and smiled softly at him.

“Looks perfect,” she said softly. 

Something seemed to settle within him and he relaxed, grinned right back at her, and stuffed his hands in his pockets. “That’s what I thought, too.” Another, wider grin, and then: “‘Sides, they can protect us against bears and evil forest spirits.”

She rolled her eyes, the moment broken and their normal banter returning. “Oh, forest spirits, huh?”

“_Yeah,_ Claire. Don’t you know about the New York Catskills spirits? Ho boy. Okay, settle in. Wait, first, we need beer and cast irons and _god_, I’m hungry. Looks like we’re multitasking tonight, Claire. Storytelling and steak!”

It should be stressful, she thought. He’s a tornado of energy, brain bouncing between thoughts without a breath and it should make her introverted self want to curl up and cry. But it’s just _not._ It’s soothing and comforting. She can sit back and let him fill the silences around her. 

She rummaged around in the cooler and tossed him a can of ice cold beer (and really, that cooler _is_ amazing) and popped up the tab of her own beer, settling next to him and helping to prep the steaks, zucchini, and mushrooms for dinner. 

They worked together effortlessly, just as easily as if they were back-to-back in the BA Test Kitchen. In less than twenty minutes, they had seared steak and perfectly fire-roasted vegetables. 

“God,” he breathed out, stacking their plates for clean-up later and leaning back in his chair and staring up at the sky. “Check those beauties out, Claire.”

She followed his lead and leaned her head back and her breath caught. The sky was pitch black, the outlines of the trees just vague blots around them. But etched upon the canvas of the sky was startling bright stars, woven in patterns that were simultaneously chaotic and ordered. 

“Wow,” she whispered, eyes glued to the vast sky. But then she felt the itch to _move, _to _do_ something. “We should clean up.”

She made a move to get up, but Brad’s big hand stopped her by wrapping itself around her forearm, keeping her in her chair. She glanced at him, but his eyes were still on the sky, mouth parted in wonder. 

“It can wait a few more minutes, Claire,” he said softly. “Just relax.”

_Relax._ The whole point of this camping trip. One of the only things she ever struggled with. She let herself sag back into the chair and tilt her head up towards the sky. 

For the first time in months, her heart felt light. She took in the stars, the bright chirp of crickets and the crackle of the wood in the fire, the dark smoke that filled the air. 

But most of all, she focused on the heavy, searing warmth of Brad’s hand still wrapped around her arm. 

____________________

Closing down camp for the night happened quickly. Brad told her to change into her sleeping clothes while he snuffed out the fire and wrapped up the trash tightly, locking it up in their truck to keep scavengers away. 

Inside the tent, Claire realized how small a one-person tent was. It was clearly meant for, well, one person. As she slipped out of her jeans and long sleeved shirt and into sweat pants and her favorite Harvard hoodie, she struggled to imagine how they were ever going to sleep comfortably in here once Brad’s gigantic frame was added to the mix. 

But their sleeping bags are piled up together nicely and the day has been _so long_ (seriously, Saffitzes just were not meant to start their day at 6am) and she’s almost more exhausted than she is nervous about being in such close quarters with Brad. 

She unzipped the tent and clamored out ungracefully, pulling her hair loose from its bun, letting her curls tumble around her shoulders. With the sun long gone and their fire out, the chill from the mountains settled over them. She shivered and pulled her hoodie closer around her. 

“Hey, Brad! All yours—oh.”

Brad had apparently grown impatient and had simply changed out in the open, his pile of clothes off to the side. 

Not for the first time this weekend, Brad left her feeling off-kilter. He was practically naked, she thought. His baseball cap was missing, leaving his hair a riotous mess atop his head, an explosion of curls. Instead of his button-up flannel and jeans, he was in soft-looking sweats and a dark grey tank that left no doubt in her mind about Brad’s strength. His arms were on clear display, his shoulders sculpted and overwhelmingly _big_. 

He grinned big and bright at her and the combination of his smile and the way she felt at the sight of his bare arms and hatless head was more than enough to warm her against the chill of the evening. 

“‘Bout time, Claire! Geez, thought you were gonna leave me out here.” He yawned, big and exaggerated. “Okay, Saffitz. Day one of camping in the books. Let’s hit the hay.”

The riot of butterflies that had temporarily disappeared suddenly exploded in her stomach as he brushed past her, slipping inside the tent and settling into his sleeping bag. The lantern in the corner of the tent illuminated his form and their joined shadows danced along the walls of the tent as she slipped into her own sleeping bag beside him. 

An awkward silence filled the tent as they both readjusted their sleeping bags and studiously ignored the scant few inches between them. Claire licked her lips and tucked herself further into the sleeping bag. 

“Well, uh, good night,” she offered. Brad looked over at her from where his head peeked out of the end of his sleeping bag and beamed. 

“Night, Claire.”

And with a single flick of his hand against the lantern, the tent was doused in darkness. 

A few minutes went by and then: “Hey, Claire?”

She rolled her eyes fondly. “Yeah, Brad?”

“I’m really glad you came out here with me this weekend.”

Inexplicably, tears stung her eyes at the sincerity in his voice and the rush of gratitude she felt towards him. She cleared her throat and nodded, even though she knew he couldn’t see her.

“Me too,” she answered. “Me too.”

__________________________

Sleeping in a tent wasn’t exactly the most comfortable of sleeping experiences on a good night. Brad wants to sleep, wants to drift off into dreamland. 

Except he can _feel _Claire thinking. Her breaths were uneven and when he opens an eye, her face was illuminated by the bright light of her phone. He can see her Googling Starbursts, candy temperatures, and taffy making. Brad considered letting it go, not saying anything just this one time. But then he heard her heavy sigh, so very different than the string of giggles that had filled their day so far. Brad pushed himself up onto an elbow and reached over her shoulder to pluck her phone from his hands, turning it off and tucking it beneath his pillow.

“What! Brad!” she hissed, indignant. 

“Nuh-uh! Claire, this weekend is about relaxing. No more phone. Brad’s orders. Now stop it. Go to sleep.”

She gaped at him and watched as he tucked her phone into the corner of the tent and flopped back under the sleeping bag, closing his eyes and ignoring her glare that he can feel. She wanted to argue and maybe even figure out a way to slip her hand beneath his pillow and steal back her phone. It wasn’t like she was sending emails or anything. She just really, _really_ wanted to know more about sugar cooking temperatures. 

But before she can fully realize a plan, he reached out with reflexes she hadn’t expected from him and tugged sleepily at her shirt, pulling her back into her sleeping bag with another firm command. “_Sleep, _Saffitz. And if you’re good, I’ll let you research sugar temps on the way home Monday morning.”

“But—“

“Can’t hear you now, Claire. Brad’s asleep.”

She rolled her eyes and huffed, pulling the sleeping bag tight around her. This time, she focuses not on pending emails and sugar cooking temperatures, but on the sound of crickets and the wind rustling and Brad’s warm and steady even breathing behind her.

Her mind wanders to Brad fully for the first time since those first few weeks she’d started at the BA Test Kitchen. In those early weeks, she’d entertained fantasies about clandestine meetings in the walk-in and steamy sessions in the kitchen late at night. 

But somewhere along the line, the strength of their friendship and her reliance on him had outweighed the imagined thrill and rush of his lips on hers and his hands on her hips. 

Tonight, on a weekend where he’s ordered her to relax, she takes comfort in the warmth of him behind her, steady and sure. His breathing evens out finally into soft snores and it makes her grin. Even in sleep, Brad makes noise. 

She matches her breath to his and before too long, her heavy eyes fall close and sleep finds her. 

When she wakes, sunlight filters through the breathable material of the tent. At first, she feels disoriented, forgetting where she is and why she’s so warm. Every muscle in her body feels pleasantly heavy. And then her pillow breathes beneath her and she snaps awake. 

Her eyes open in a rush and she’s met with the sight of Brad’s chest and shoulder beneath her cheek, her socked feet tucked between his calves, and her fists curled softly into the front of his shirt. He’s sleeping soundly, a hand on her hip as an anchor, and his breath ruffles her hair with every breath. 

It’s the most relaxed she’s ever been.

But panic fills her. Brad is just her friend—her best friend, really. And they only have a few more days out here together. She doesn’t want to open to the door that they both have been carefully avoiding, the one they occasionally knock on before running away. Not if it means that the door is going to be closed to her once they return to the city. On one side of the door is friendship, steady and certain and reliable. On the other side….

Well, Claire doesn’t like unknown variables. Even if they’re handsome as hell and make her want to just be _better_.

In a few carefully orchestrated moves, she rolls and disentangles herself from him, slipping out of the cocoon of their tent and into the fresh air of the Catskills. While Brad sleeps, she can at least brush her teeth and splash water on her face. Away from the warmth of him, the scent of him, she can think clearly and get herself under control. 

When she comes back to the center of camp after freshening up, Brad is outside, reigniting the campfire, setting the coffee on the fire grate, and searing off some bacon and eggs and toast. 

“Well hey there, sleepyhead,” he grins, pushing around the scrambled yolks in the cast iron and gesturing to the metal coffee pot. “Coffee’s going. Listen! I was thinkin’ we do a little fishin’ today, pack up the cooler and head down to the lake, catch ourselves some dinner. What do you think? Because I’m tellin’ ya, I think there’s some _whoppers_ in that lake just waiting for us to come and catch ‘em.”

She curls up in her camp chair across from him and watches him work, cradles the steaming cup of coffee in her hand and takes a grateful sip. 

For a moment, she considers interrupting him to ask if he remembers waking up with her in his arms, if he has any thoughts on that and if they should maybe consider doing it again. But she can’t see any sign that he’s even aware that they woke up together in the first place. Better to leave it.

Besides, they survived the first night and they’re going fishing today. How much trouble could they really get into? 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> one night down and two to go. ps it feels very unnatural to write the number of times brad says claire's name, but, uh, it's true to life. brad, my man. plz.


	4. Chapter 4

It takes her two cups of campfire coffee, a Brad monologue about his favorite camping rhymes (“Claire, look at this! ‘Leaves of three, let it be.’ That’s poison ivy, don’t wanna go touching that! Gonna be _miserable_ and itchy, the _opposite_ of what we wanna be this weekend, right?”), and a mile walk to the lake carrying chairs, their fishing gear, and a cooler before Claire talks herself out of a complete freakout. 

It’s futile to try and make excuses, to blame the drop in temperatures and the simple science of seeking warmth for the reason she woke up in his arms. She knows the truth: the crush she’s been desperately trying to tamp down has grown out of control and into something a lot deeper and a lot more pervasive, wrapping itself around her subconscious. 

Accepting it feels like one less burden, one less stress on her already weighed-down shoulders. She can’t balance the overwhelming nature of her job, her upcoming book, and trying to lie to herself about how she feels about Brad. This camping trip is evidence that something is going to break. 

But the decision to risk her friendship with Brad on the off-chance that he feels the same is put on hold as they break through the end of the trailhead and find themselves in a secluded, picturesque bank alongside a beautifully blue lake, sunlight glinting and bouncing off the water’s surface. 

“Oh, _Claire_, look at this, huh? Fuckin’ gorgeous.” He turns to her with a bright grin and claps his hands together in excitement. “Let’s fish.”

Working together seamlessly, as they almost always do, it takes almost no time to pop out the chairs, crack open the water and beer, and get the cooler and tackle boxes propped open. 

“_Brad,_” she whines, frowning in frustration at the loop of fishing line in her hand and the way it absolutely refuses to knot and secure her hook at the end of the rod. “It’s not—I can’t. _Help.”_

_“_C’mere.”

His hand bops hers out of the way and she swallows thickly against the easy, casual way he touches her, invades her space. It doesn’t help that his fingers are on display—moving delicately and swiftly as he unknots and re-loops the fishing line along her rod, securing the hook and lure at the tip. 

“There ya go, Claire. Alright, now we kick back.” He falls back against his chair and picks up his rod, legs splaying open in complete relaxation. “We take a healthy gulp of our beer.” He makes an annoyed gesture at her, encouraging her to follow suit and pick up her beer, too. She does so with a roll of her eyes, but can’t deny the blend of the hot mid-morning sun and the cold beer and the breeze coming off the water is pretty incredible.

She hates when Brad’s right.

“And now we fish.”

Together, they cast their lures into the lake, their red and white fishing bobs bouncing merrily in the water side-by-side. It’s peaceful and silent and she feels herself sinking further into her chair, the rod going slightly lax in her hand. 

The silence lasts for all of five seconds. 

Because Brad is pretty incapable of both sitting still _and_ being silent, which means something’s gotta give. 

But Brad fills the silence in a way that isn’t intrusive. She closes her eyes behind her sunglasses, leans her head back, and listens to him tell her stories about growing up in New Jersey, hunting and fishing with his dad, and how he’d once fallen into the lake as a kid after being dragged out of his chair by a giant catfish.

“Oh, Claire, you shoulda seen this thing. It was a _monster._ Like, it was basically the size of you. Claire—Claire, are you even listening?”

She lifts her sunglasses so he can get the full effect of her glare and scrunches her nose at him. “You’re telling a story, Brad. Of course I’m listening. You never know what you’re going to get out of a Brad Leone story. Gotta be paying attention.”

He reels his empty lure back in and recasts. She follows suit. Silence falls over them before he shifts in his seat and clears his throat. 

“So, can’t help but notice I’ve been doin’ a lot of talkin’ here, Saffitz.”

“Pretty hard to get a word in,” she teases.

“Yeah, okay, I just figured, y’know. You wouldn’t wanna talk about what’s been buggin’ you. But, y’know, if you do….” He adjusts his hat and pulls the brim down low, carefully avoiding looking at her. “Well, I’m here for ya.”

It’s conversational and casual but it hits her heavy in the chest. Brad is one of the most sensitive, caring people she knows. But his attention is often divided among their friends at work. It feels like she’s been given something precious and important to have all of his focus on her. 

“Brad,” she sighs. “I’m just stressed, I guess. And clearly not handling it well.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“You? But you always seems so, so—“

“Claire, just because I’m not running around the kitchen groaning and sighing and banging dough doesn’t mean I’m not stressed.”

“I don’t _bang_ the dough,” she says petulantly. She reels her lure in and throws it back out into the lake. “What have you been stressed about?”

“Oh, this and that.” He looks at her from the corner of his eye and then decides to opt for honesty. “I worry about the future. What’s gonna happen after YouTube decides it’s bored with me. What I’m gonna do when the rollercoaster comes to a stop and they kick me off this ride. Where I’m gonna go after all of this.”

It’s the first she’s ever heard him talk like this: of the future, of a life outside the Test Kitchen. It alarms her, a curveball she hadn’t seen coming. 

“You’re thinking of leaving?” She wonders if he hears the panic in her voice.

“Oh, god no. There’s—“ He hesitates, tightens his grip on his rod, and then admits, “There’s still some things holding me at Bon Appétit.”

She doesn’t have the courage—either of her own making or of the alcohol’s—to ask him if she’s one of those things.

Instead, she bites her lip and nods, looks out over the water. "Yeah, I know what you mean." She takes a deep breath and closes her eyes, lets her heart beat riotously. Her head is clouding up again, too many things and not enough time to carefully parse through them and categorize them.

"You thinkin' about leaving us—the kitchen, I mean—for good?”

She cracks open an eye and looks at him. He's staring out over the water, too. She can see the way his jaw is tight and clenched, though, and the way his knuckles are white around his fishing pole. Like he's waiting for the worst news of his life to be delivered.

Claire tries to imagine a life completely devoid of the chaos of the Bon Appétit kitchen. 

Tries to think about never making another Gourmet Makes episode or seeing her friends in their element. She thinks about never seeing Brad, never having him lean up against the countertop next to her and teasing her and giving her ridiculous nicknames and—

She reels in her lure again and throws it back out. "No, I think I'm staying put for a while. There are...things, still here for me, too.”

Beside her, Brad relaxes completely. "Good, good. That’s...good."

It feels like they’re having two completely different conversations and she’s only catching every other word. She speaks French and English, but she’s still getting the hang of Brad. 

But any further discussion is stopped when her rod lurches in her hands and she yelps, “Oh my god! I got something, I got something!”

Whatever is on the other line is big and strong, stronger than her, because she can feel it pulling her out of her chair. Beside her, Brad is scrambling to stake his rod in the dirt so he can lend her his strength to help her reel it in. But it’s too late and she’s already out of her chair and stumbling towards the lake shoreline.

“Brad!” Nervous, excited laugher bubbles out of her, unbelieving of the fact that a _fish_ is dragging her like this. “Jesus, are there sharks or something in here?”

“Oh yeah, the famous lake sharks, Claire. Woo! You got a big boy!” He’s right behind her, big and warm and strong. In a few movements, he plants his feet on either side of her and wraps his arms around her, his hands joining hers on the rod, stacked over hers. 

"Woah, woah, woah, Claire! It's gonna pull you right in! I got ya, I got ya.”

Keeping one hand on the rod, he steadies his other hand on her hip, tapping gently. “Kay, we’re gonna walk it back, okay? I got you on the rod, but keep walking back and reeling in, let it go a little slack if it feels too tense. We don’t wanna break the line.”

It’s hard for her to concentrate on all the tips he’s giving her and reeling in the giant fish on the end of her line when he’s pressed against her from behind, when his hands are touching hers, when his lips are brushing against the shell of her ear and telling her she can do this and he has faith in her. 

Eventually, though, the fish breaks the water, flopping and flipping at the end of her line. He plants his feet into the soft dirt of the bank and laughs when she doesn’t stop walking and backs into him, her back to his chest. “Okay, this is all you, Claire. You’ve got this.”

He keeps a steadying, heavy hand on her hip that she can feel through the canvas material of her shorts. Claire can see where he relaxes his grip on her rod, more of a guiding, helping hand than anything else. He’s giving her the power and control here to accomplish this. She never feels that she's in danger of losing the catch or of falling in. Brad's got her.

When she finishes reeling in the catfish, flipping and wriggling on the bank—“Oh, hello! He’s bigger than you, Claire! Jesus!”—she turns and wraps her arms around his neck in an unguarded moment of adrenaline and joy, drops the fishing rod to the ground.

“We did it!” she squeals, insanely proud of herself. She’d gone fly fishing as a kid, had even been bizarrely good at it. But spin fishing like this was new to her. And she’d _done_ it. 

He stumbles back under the weight of her but laughs and returns her embrace, wraps his arms around her waist and picks her up, spins her around in triumph. 

When her feet hit the ground, she finds herself pressed against him closer than she was before. Her hands are slow to unwind from his neck and she notices he doesn’t let her go, either. She drags her hands over his chest and swallows hard, ducks her head. 

“Hey, Claire?”

Brad’s voice is low and rough, nothing like the high-pitched laughter of just a few minutes ago. It catches her attention and she peers back up at him. Immediately, she wishes he wasn’t wearing sunglasses, wants to see his eyes. 

“I’d—“ He clears his throat and steps back, puts some space between them. “I really don’t want you to leave the kitchen again. I, uh, wasn’t a fan the first time.”

Something catches in her chest at his words. They’ve never talked about her brief time away from the kitchen, the strain it had put on their friendship without seeing each other every day. But there’s a desperate, confessional tone to his voice now that makes her think that maybe they should have. 

She reaches for him, wraps her fingers around his wrist. “I don’t want you to leave the kitchen, either.” 

_I don’t want you to leave me._

Although she doesn’t say it out loud, she thinks maybe he heard it anyway. Maybe his Claire-speak is getting better and better and he hears the things she’s too scared to say now. Maybe she isn’t the only one experiencing shifting feelings. 

“Looks like we’re stuck with each other, Saffitz.”

“Looks like,” she agrees, biting her lip. 

When she hears the plop of the catfish escaping back into the lake, hook and line still in its mouth, she can’t find it within herself to be disappointed at the loss. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> keep an eye on upcoming rating changes....


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> psa: brad and claire are gonna smoke some pot in this chapter, so if that bothers you, please skip this chapter.

They linger at the lake long after they finish catching their dinner. Claire curls herself up in her camping chair and listens as Brad regals her with stories of the things he and Vinny got up to when they traveled, the people he’d met and the places he wished he could take her.

She grins at him, folded hands tucked under her chin. “One day.”

Brad takes a long drag of his beer before speaking, fiddles and readjusts with the leather band of his watch to buy some time. “Y’know, we don’t gotta wait for Rapo and Duckor to sign off on you comin’ with me somewhere one weekend, Claire. We could just…_go. _We seem to be doin’ alright together so far.”

The thing is, Claire realizes, they’re doing more than alright this weekend. From the moment he’d suggested this weekend together, it had never been weird or awkward or strange just spending time one-on-one with him. It was one thing to spend almost every lunch with him at the office and grab the occasional drink outside of work. It was an entirely different thing to spend every hour together nonstop for a weekend. 

But despite her introverted tendencies to withdraw and pull away, everything about Brad—spending time with him, listening to his stories, watching him work—it all drew her in, calmed her down.

It’s terrifying and comforting all at once. 

She swallows and smiles softly. “Yeah,” she agrees. “Another weekend would be good.”

Butterflies erupt in her stomach and giddiness bubbles up in her throat, escaping as little giggles, when Brad fist pumps, claps his hands together, and beams at her. 

“Oh boy, Claire. Okay, I’ll think of somewhere good.”

She spends the rest of the time beside the lake thinking about the fact that Brad wants to spend the weekend with her again, that he’s planning a future for them. 

_____________________

The second night they spend together, something has shifted between them. Dinner is strangely calming. Cooking with Brad always reminds her why she loves cooking. It’s off-the-cuff and innovative—as much as it can be with limited supplies and spices. But music plays softly from their Bluetooth speaker and they work side by side, offering suggestions and building flavor profiles together. 

“Ooh, ooh, add a little, uh, y’know?”

“Yeah, yeah.” He squeezes a healthy amount of lemon over the roasted and crispy fish, then reaches over and plucks a zucchini slice out of her cast iron, chewing thoughtfully. “Oh, _nice_, Claire. Little heat. I like it.”

“You want more cayenne, don’t you?”

He grins. “You read my mind.”

After, when they’re pleasantly full after dinner, Brad brings out a deck of cards and the rolled joints out of the front pocket of his backpack. She raises an eyebrow at him when he lights up and takes a long, deep drag. 

“Don’t look at me like that,” he says. He groans and exhales, settles into his chair and splays his legs, completely relaxed. “This is basically a requirement for camping. Best way to enjoy nature, Claire.”

She bites her lip, considers him for a moment, and then decides she’s on _vacation_ and the whole point of this weekend was to relax. The decision to reach over and pluck the joint from his fingers is a surprisingly easy one.

“I packed more than one, you know,” he drawls, amused. She sticks her tongue out at him and kindly refrains from reminding him they share single Starbursts and cherry chapstick. 

He kindly doesn’t laugh when she breaks into a coughing fit at her first inhale. She tries again and lets the earthy, herbal aroma wrap itself around her. The fog that settles over her brain is more than welcome and she sighs and settles back against her chair and rolls her head towards him, grinning triumphantly and handing him back the spliff. 

“I haven’t done this since college,” she admits, already feeling loose and light. 

“Harvard, I’m shocked at you. Rule breaking? Don’t think this was legal then, Claire. What else did you get up to in your rebel days?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?,” she teases back. 

It feels dangerously like flirting and for once, she’s not afraid. She licks her lips and likes the way his hooded eyes drop to her mouth. It makes her feel hot in a way that has nothing to do with the fire crackling at their feet. 

Brad nods and deliberately lets his fingers brush over hers as they exchange the joint once more.

“Yeah,” he says, voice rough. “I would.”

Her flirting skills only go so far and she blushes, ducks her head and twirls her braid in her free hand. Brad saves her, though, straightens up and pulls the cards from their box and waves them in her face.

“Okay, Claire,” he announces. “We went fishing today and now? We _Go Fish_ing.”

She laughs at his pun—a brand of humor that she can always appreciate—and leans forward, meeting his gaze head-on. 

“Bring it on, Leone.”

_____________________

She wins _Go Fish_ in a best of seven series and by the end, she is well and truly high in a way she hasn’t been since she was eighteen years old and desperate and excited to try everything new in college, everything that she couldn’t quite bring herself to do in her midwest hometown.

Every inch of her body feels light and loose, her mind feels sleepy and calm and quiet for the first time in months. The stress of _Gourmet Makes_ and the pressure of her cookbook deadline and her growing insomnia and anxiety all fade away. She shushes Brad and rummages in her bag for her journal and jots down the ideas flowing through her: savory scones featuring sage and gruyère and pumpkin, black pepper and fresh finger molasses cookies, flaky pastry stuffed with apple butter and par-cooked chunky apples. 

The ideas flow through her and when she looks up, the fire is down to embers and Brad is standing in front of her, gently reaching for her notebook with one hand and her arm with the other, tugging her up out of her chair.

“C’mon, Claire,” he tells her, voice low and soothing. When she stands, she feels woozy and a little unsteady on her feet. But Brad is there, his arm around her and gently guiding her to the comfort of their tent. “I got you,” he tells her. She leans against him, suddenly and overwhelmingly exhausted. Everything feels sluggish and sleepy and her limbs are heavy, like walking is a task that requires every ounce of thought. 

Tonight, they don’t bother with changing into sleep clothes. Exhaustion and a drop in temperature means neither of them are in any hurry to take off the sweatshirts and soft, worn jeans they’re in. 

“Okay, Claire,” he says, unzipping her sleeping bag for her and helping her in, his hand wrapped around hers for support.

She slides in easily, burrowing down in the warm, soft padding of her sleeping bag. It’s like the pot has let her finally _feel_ the consequences of her insomnia and stress of the last few months. As such, nothing has felt as good as this sleeping bag. 

When she next opens her eyes, she realizes she’s fallen asleep at some point. The tent is pitch black and behind her, Brad is burrowed down in his own sleeping bag, snoring softly. Shivers overtake her—a combination of the dropped temperatures and the overwhelming sense of _home_ she feels at the knowledge that Brad is there with her: his warmth, his scent, his presence. 

But she _is_ cold and the decision to wiggle over closer to him is mostly motivated by her need for warmth—which he is radiating—and a general, thrumming sense of _I want to be close to him._

He reaches for her as soon as she comes within reach and it startles her when he sleepily tucks her against his chest, his arm wrapping around her back and shoulders. 

“Cold,” she murmurs, pressing her cold nose into the warmth of his chest, nuzzling against the fabric of his sweatshirt and sleeping bag. The earthy aroma of the marijuana clings to him, mixes pleasantly with the smoke from the campfire and the woodsy, piny scent that normally accompanies him wherever he goes. 

“S’okay,” he whispers, tightening his hold on her. “I got you. Sleep.”

It’s the second time he’s said as much tonight and as she presses closer, curls her fingers into his shirt and closes her eyes to sleep once more, she believes him. 

He’s got her. 

She drifts to sleep wrapped in his arms, his scent, and the promise of tomorrow. Things are changing between them and she’s never been more ready to see what tomorrow brings. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay i PROMISE there is kissing next chapter, hang in there.


	6. Chapter 6

On the morning of their last full day at the campsite, Brad wakes just before the sun does to find himself with an armful of Claire Saffitz. She’s tucked up tightly against him, each hot exhale of her breath hitting his neck, her feet brushing his calves, and his shirt bunched in her loosely curled hand.

The decision to invite her along with him to this camping weekend retreat may be the best thing he’s ever done. For the first time in months, she reminds him of the Claire he knew in the early days again. Yesterday had felt like the old days: the easy flirting and even easier smiles. It gives him hope that the feelings he’d brushed aside are there for both of them.

Brad drops a soft kiss to the top of her head and pulls her a little closer, opting to let her sleep a little longer. His nose lingers at the crown of her head, nuzzling softly and inhaling the scent of her: clean and sugary and _Claire_. 

The point of this weekend was to just relax her, take her mind off of the kitchen and the impending pressures of the outside world—a reminder that she is more than just the baker in the kitchen. Judging from the soft, snuffling noises she’s making as she presses impossibly closer, makes a sleepy little whine and nuzzles into his chest, she’s perfectly relaxed. 

What he hadn’t expected was for himself to change, too. He’d settled for locking up his feelings for her, not believing that someone like Claire Saffitz would ever look twice at him and content with their friendship. But Claire _has_ looked at him twice this weekend. Three or four or fives times even. 

He’s stupid, sometimes, yeah. But he’s not blind and _something_ is different. Something happened on that lake, something _clicked_ for them both, a knowing lightbulb alight over their heads.

And wasn’t the saying, run towards the light at the end of the tunnel or something like that?

Claire was his light and he was done shading his eyes. He was ready to sprint full throttle towards it, risk of sunburn be damned. 

Shit, he really needed to work on his metaphors. 

The tent begins to warm with the rising sun’s rays, strands of light filtering in, and Brad knows he needs to get the fire going again so he can get Claire’s morning coffee percolating so she can function.

Before he slips out of the tent, he drapes a spare flannel over her shoulders and fights the urge to lay back down beside her when she immediately bundles the flannel beneath her cheek and presses her nose into the fabric. 

________________________

Neither one of them mentions the flannel or the way they slept last night, though. Instead, Claire takes the coffee from him gratefully, their fingers brushing on the handoff, and then fusses at him and backseat cooks—a thing he didn’t even know was possible until he started cooking with Claire. 

“No, no, Brad, you gotta add the—Oh, yeah, okay you got it.” A moment of silence and then: “Oh, Brad, Brad, no, what about the garlic?”

He huffs, a grin twitching at his lips, as he puts his hands on his hips and waves the spatula at her. “You wanna cook?”

She beams. “Actually, I’d love to.”

Rolling his eyes, muttering about picking your battles, he steps back from the fire and the skillet and lets Claire take his place, her hands already pulling her hair up into a loose bun and looking critically at their breakfast to-be. 

He decides that watching her cook—the way the thin sheen of sweat coats her skin, the little crease between her brows as she tastes the seasoning on their eggs and makes adjustments—is a much better way to spend his morning anyway. 

Turns out it’s better to just let Claire have what she wants. He’s happy to oblige. 

After their co-cooked breakfast, they get dressed and booted up, put snacks and water bottles into their backpacks, and he adjusts his ball cap and sunglasses and claps his hands, rubs them together excitedly.

“Let’s go hiking, Claire.”

The hike itself is long, but not strenuous or difficult. They cross over some rocky terrain here and there that requires Brad to stop ahead of her and reach for her, hand outreached. It’s only on the third time it happens that he realizes she’s taking longer and longer to let go of his hand. 

She stops to take pictures of a couple of squirrels that keep following after them, chittering at her and Brad. 

“Brad, do you see this? I’m telling you, they’re following us.”

“Yeah, I bet they are. I’ve been throwin’ em some of our trail mix.” He rummages in his side pocket and tosses another handful of peanuts and raisins at them. “Gah, look at ‘em! They love it!”

“Brad!”

“Claire,” he says patiently. “This is the beauty of hiking in nature. Making _friends_ with the locals.”

She just laughs and pushes at his backpack, “C’mon, Ranger Rick.”

They pause at the next opening in the trailhead, a smooth cliff face for them to drop their packs and sit on the edge, feet dangling, as they look over the tops of trees and down into the valley below them. The wind rustles the tops of the trees and the ends of their hair. Birds and crickets chirp merrily, fill the massive silence. 

“It’s nice,” she says softly, leaning back onto her palms and staring out over the scenery before them. “No cars, no people, no honking and yelling. It’s just quiet. And peaceful.”

“The city’s pretty great,” he says, joins her in leaning back on his hands. His pinky brushes along hers. Neither move their hands, though. “But you kinda lose yourself, y’know? Feels like the city will swallow you up and never let you go. Gets hard to breathe.”

“Yeah,” she agrees. “It felt like I was getting lost. That the things that were important were getting lost. But I—I think I know what’s important now.”

“Yeah?”

She tears her eyes from the gorgeous view and focuses on his profile, lets her pinky sneak out to brush alongside his—this time deliberate—and swallows against the dryness of her mouth that has nothing to do with the afternoon hike.

“Yeah.”

Brad smiles at her, nudges his pinky back against hers. “Then this weekend was a success. Brad Leone’s Patented Relaxation Plan is almost complete.”

“Almost complete? What’s left?” She wonders if he can hear the breathless quality of her voice, wonders if it’s anticipation at what else could be on the agenda for his relaxation plan. 

He pushes himself to his feet, steps away from the ledge and offers her his hand to help her up.

“One word for you, Claire: S’mores.”

________________________

By the time they get back from their hike, they’re exhausted and sweaty and Claire is begging for a shower and, to be honest, so is he. They consult with the campsite map and find the nearest facility and make their way to the showers, Brad teasing her about being on the lookout for scorpions and friendly neighborhood spiders.

“Brad, shut up, there are _not_ scorpions in New York.”

“If you say so…”

She looks worried and unsure for a moment and Brad can barely keep his laughter in. She’s too easy sometimes. 

But they both survive their showers—no scorpions in sight and only a few spider appearances (Claire keeps a _very_ close eye on the brown spider in the corner of her stall)—and in no time at all they find themselves back around their campfire, their towels laid out to the side to dry by the heat of the flames. 

Dinner isn’t anything fancy tonight, just using up the last of their ingredients: sautéed veggies, a couple of sausage links and some rough-chopped bacon. It’s delicious and when she sits back and groans, hand on her extended stomach, he teases her as he clears their plates.

“Does that mean you don’t have room for dessert, Saffitz?”

She perks up, eyes bright. Her damp hair is frizzing and curling, courtesy of the fire, and he thinks she looks absolutely adorable. “Brad,” she says with a long-suffering sigh, as if this is knowledge he should already have. “Don’t you know everyone has _two_ stomachs?”

“Oh they do, do they?”

“_Yes._ There’s a stomach for dinner and a stomach for dessert. There’s _always_ room for dessert. Especially s’mores.”

He tosses her the bag of marshmallows and chocolate bars. She raises her eyes at the brand of chocolate. “Scharffen Berger? For _s’mores_? Brad,” she says appreciatively. “You fancy.”

“Only the best for you, Claire.”

It turns out, though, Brad is a horrible, terrible s’mores maker. He barely toasts his marshmallow and puts the tiniest brick of chocolate between his graham crackers. 

“Brad,” she says in horror, watching him pull his barely-browned marshmallow from the fire. “That needs, like, thirty more seconds. Minimum.”

He huffs, rolls his eyes, and makes deliberate eye contact with her as he bites into his s’more, marshmallow still firm. “Claire, just because I don’t _burn_ mine, it doesn’t mean I’m doing it wrong.”

The pointed look at her own marshmallow, which is burned to all hell, the sugar so far beyond caramelized and drifting into blackened territory. She raises an eyebrow and waves her marshmallow in his face. “_This,_” she insists, “is the correct way to eat a s’more.”

She builds the perfect s’more: thick layer of chocolate and an ooey-gooey marshmallow that oozes out from the sides.

He grins at the way she sighs, eyes fluttering closed, and chewing carefully. “God, I love camping,” she sighs happily, taking another bite of her dessert.

When she looks up next, though, giggles overtake her. Brad has sticky, white marshmallow sticking to his beard and chocolate smeared over his top lip. 

“Brad,” she giggles, hand mid-air and reaching for him, as if to wipe away the chocolate for herself, but catches herself. “You got a little something there.”

He grimaces and wipes at his face with his giant hand, pawing at his mouth and beard until he’s more or less clean. 

“Good?”

She looks at him, takes her time in trailing her gaze over his mouth, before meeting his eyes again. “Yeah,” she murmurs, voice thick. “You’re good.”

The weekend, they both realize, has been hurtling towards this moment. Hell, maybe they’ve been heading for this moment since the day she stuck her hand out on that first day and introduced herself. 

The fire crackles between them and he stands, takes a pull from his beer, and drops it in his cupholder, reaches out a hand to her and pulls her up, so they're pressed toe-to-toe. 

She laughs, looks up at him, confused. “What are we doing?”

He doesn’t know if she means right this moment or about _them_, but it doesn’t matter. The answer is the same either way. 

"Dance with me, Claire."

"What? Brad…” She looks at him with wide eyes, like he’s crazy for suggesting it.

He tugs her forward anyway, grinning. “We’re in the middle of nowhere. Ain’t no one watching. Besides, this is all part of the Brad Leone Relaxation Plan.”

“How many steps are actually in this plan?” she says in a deadpan voice. 

“Oh my god, Claire. Just trust me. C'mon."

He drops her hand to turn up the music that's been playing softly in the background before returning to her, taking her hand easily and tugging her forward into his arms, already swaying and moving together. Dancing with Claire feels a lot like cooking with Claire: stepping and side-stepping, anticipating movements and needs.

The slightly upbeat music shifts, though, into something softer and slower. Brad doesn't hesitate, even as Claire does, looking up at him from beneath lowered lashes, unsure. 

But he licks his lips and slips an arm around her waist, tucks their joined hands against his chest. "C'mon, Claire," he cajoles softly. "Dance with me.”

They're slow dancing and their feet are crunching the leaves and sticks and the fire crackles and her cheek rests against his chest and his chin rests on the top of her head and she can hear him humming along to the music off-tune and it rumbles through her, settles in her chest alongside her heart where he’s always belonged. 

The music ends but he doesn't let go of her and she lifts her head and licks her lips, only to find him looking down at her with a soft, open expression on his face.

"Claire..." 

She swallows hard and pushes up onto her tiptoes, but the gesture is unnecessary. She doesn't have far to go because Brad is already leaning down to meet her. The first touch of their lips is a shock to the system. She'd thought about the way he'd taste and feel in a peripheral, abstract way—too scared to think about it too hard for fear that she'd never stop wanting him if she let herself start. 

But now that she has him, now that she knows what his beard feels like prickling against her top lip and that his big hands hold her hips and cup her cheek and that, despite the fact that he brims with boundless, non-stop energy, he is completely still under her touch, completely focused on her. 

But then, because she’s Claire Saffitz and she doesn’t have the patience to let him seduce her, her tongue brushes at the seam of his mouth and he comes to life, pressing into the kiss and clutching desperately at her with a groan. 

She wraps her arms around his neck and holds on while he kisses her deeply, tongue slipping easily into her mouth and stroking over the roof of her mouth and over her teeth and laving at her tongue in a way that makes her moan low in her throat and curl her toes. 

“God,” she pants, pulling away and tilting her head back, exposing her throat for him so he can nip and suck and lick his way down the column of her neck, over the dip of the hollow in her throat. Her fingers slide into hair, knock his beanie off so she can tug at his soft, damp hair. 

“Brad,” she gasps, clinging to him. Her hips press against his and she can feel how hard he is against her. _She_ did that to him. “God, what are we doing?”

He pulls back with one last, tender kiss to the underside of her jaw. His normally blue eyes are dark and blown wide, more black with a rim of blue around the outside. When he cups her cheek in his hand, she instinctively turns into his touch, nuzzles against his palm and plants a soft kiss to his wrist. 

“I don’t know,” he admits, thumb stroking the curve of her cheek. “But I know I’ve wanted this—you—for a long time now. And I think,” he takes a deep breath, takes a chance. “I think you want it—me, us—too.”

It’s not the most eloquent thing he’s ever said and he knows if he had the vocabulary Claire does, if he could focus his brain on something other than the way she tastes of burned sugar and chocolate, if he could just _think, _he’s pretty sure he could come up with something better.

But she steps forward, nestles her feet between his and presses them together from chest to toe as she slides her palms up over his chest to wrap around his neck. “I forget how well you know me,” she murmurs, pushing up on her tip toes and kissing him softly. His hands drift over the curve of her breast to clutch at her hips, pulling her into the kiss, licking into her mouth and sucking her bottom lip, teeth grazing the sensitive flesh. 

She shivers and he grins into the kiss, does it again. 

“We doin’ this?” he pants against her mouth, tries to stop his hips from pressing into the softness of her body, searching for friction. “God, Claire, just tell me what you want.”

“You,” she tells him, softly at first and then again, more sure—like she’s finally realizing she’s allowed to say it, allowed to want him. “I want _you.”_

The music, the s’mores, and the bright fire are forgotten as she takes his hand, presses a kiss to the back of it, and walks him back towards the open flap of their tent where their sleeping bags wait for them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> told ya there'd be kissing.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> heed the rating change mkay!

They stumble the short distance to the tent, Brad distracted by her mouth on his chest after she had impatiently worked a few of the buttons on his flannel loose. The cool night air on his skin juxtaposed with her hot mouth sends goosebumps over his skin and he’ll never forget as long as he lives the look on her face when she first ghosted her fingertips over his chest, nails scratching over the coarse hair there, and finally pressing her lips to his sternum.

“Claire, the fire—I gotta—“ 

But her mouth is frantic on his, like a dam released, swallowing each of his words until all thoughts of fire and camping safety are gone from his head and all that’s left is _Claire, Claire, Claire. _

She grins against his skin, slides her hands up under his shirt and traces the waistband of his jeans in triumph. 

Turns out, it’s faster (and much less distracting) for him to just scoop her up in his arms and carry her into the tent. She lets out a squeal and clings to him, laughing and breathless. 

“Can’t take you anywhere,” he gripes playfully. 

When he gets her into the tent and lays her down amongst the sleeping bags and covers her body with his, pressing his hips into hers in a way that makes her gasp and widen her legs, hitching them up over his waist, he thinks this should feel stranger than it does. 

They’ve been friends and coworkers for so longer that taking this step, making this transition, should feel awkward. But there’s no hesitation in the way that she nips at the hollow of his throat, threads her fingers into his hair, and guides his mouth back down to hers. There’s nothing awkward or wrong about the way she bites at his bottom lip until he growls softly against her mouth and slides his tongue against hers, kissing her deeply. 

“Claire,” he pants, pressing his forehead to hers. He’s got his hand up her shirt, hand splayed wide and palming her stomach. She can feel every callous and cut and scar and she whines, lifts her hips up to encourage him to touch her further.

He props himself up on an elbow and stares down at her, taking a moment to admire the flush on her cheeks and the way her lips are red and swollen and her wide, dark eyes are glossy and glazed—a little frantic, a little desperate, all for him. 

“We don’t have to do this,” he tells her gently, stroking the wisps of baby fine hair at her temple. “I mean, I _want_ to, Christ, of course I do. But we don’t have to, y’know, go all the way—“

She snorts and absentmindedly strokes her palms over his chest and shoulders and back down to settle at his hips. “Go all the way?,” she teases. 

He groans and drops his head. “Work with me here, Saffitz.” But his voice is muffled into her shoulder and she laughs, threads her fingers into his curly hair and tugs lightly. He lifts his head and she kisses him softly, thighs squeezing his hips. 

“I want you,” she reiterates, kissing him again. “Please.”

It’s the _please_ that breaks him, he’s not sure he’s ever heard Claire Saffitz beg for anything. But he won’t keep her waiting. 

There's no more questions, no more waiting. Just them.

He kisses a line down her neck, nips at the jut of her collarbones, and nuzzles at the curve of her breasts through her shirt. She sighs and shivers under his touch, keeps one hand in his hair and another on his shoulder, always touching him.

The slow slide of her shirt as he pushes it up is torture and she whines his name, lifts her hips. He grins and licks a stripe over her belly, kisses her hips and drags his beard over her skin because it makes her shake and call out his name. 

But the insistent tug of her fingers in his hair is hard to ignore and he crawls back up her body, planting and peppering kisses as he goes, before letting her guide him back to where she wants him: her mouth. It’s all tongue and teeth and the wet, slippery slide of their mouths and it’s absolutely, blissfully perfect.

Their shadows play along the walls of the tent as she flips their positions and straddles his lap with a breathless, triumphant huff of laughter. It’s not the most elegant of movements, but they’re pressed together and he fits so perfectly between her legs that it feels criminal. 

Flexing his hips results in his cock, hard and aching for her, pushing between her legs where she’s hot and damp through her sweat pants for him. She shivers, closes her eyes, and rocks down against him, seeking friction. “Shit,” she murmurs to herself, almost like she didn't intend for him to hear it, lost in the sensation of him between her legs.

He leans back and stares at her in awe as she lifts her shirt and throws it to the side, her hairfalling around her shoulders in wild curls. He licks his lips and reaches up to cup her breasts,thumb rubbing over her pebbled nipple beneath the cup of her bra. She sighs out a _Yes_ and leans down and molds herself against him, kisses his neck and chest while he fumbles with the claps of her bra, desperate to get his fingertips on more bare skin.

There’s a faint light filtering into the tent from the campfire that’s outside but it’s not enough. He wants to see her—all of her. 

“Wait,” he gasps, rolling to the side and reaching for the lantern and flicking it on. “Wanna see you, Claire. _Fuck.”_

In the lantern’s light, he can see her pale skin flushed red from sunburn from their earlier afternoon hike and the places where he’d dragged his scruffy face over her shoulders and breasts and abdomen.

“Jesus Christ,” he breathes out, shaking hands reaching for her, just ghosting over her skin and dragging over the curve of her breasts. His palms easily cup their weight and she sighs, arches her back into his touch. “Beautiful,” he murmurs. “So fuckin’ beautiful.”

His voice is thick with desire and she bites her lip in response to his words. “Brad….”

It sounds like she wants to protest, wants to tell him that he’s very sweet but he doesn’t have to lie. He refuses to let her even get the words out. He pushes himself up with one hand, squeezes her breasts in his other, and kisses her, swallows down her self-doubt. 

She sags against him, wraps her arms around his neck and pushes him back to the ground, grinding her hips against his in a way that makes him break the kiss and curse, the sensation overwhelming. He wishes their first time was somewhere a little more comfortable than a couple sleeping bags and the forest floor of the Catskills. 

Their shadows play against the walls of the tent. It’s cramped together in the small one-person tent but they make it work, turning the cramped quarters to their advantage. At some point, he gets a handful of her ass and squeezes hard, causing her to buck against him and gasp his name. 

All thoughts of dragging his out, of going slow, of sliding her underwear down her legs and settling between her thighs and tonguing at her until she’s sweaty and writhing and crying out for him go out the window.

They’re off to the races. 

She scrambles to push her panties down and he lifts his hips to get his boxers off, cursing loudly when they get tangled around his ankles. It makes her giggle and she has to help him, lifting the fabric up and raising an eyebrow at the little pink frosted donut pattern. 

“Got a soft spot for doughnuts these days,” he tells her sincerely, lifting a big hand to cup her cheek, kissing her softly. She tosses the boxers to the other side of the tent where it joins the rest of their discarded clothes. 

There’s a moment where they take the moment in: completely naked and bare, flushed red and skin dewy with exertion. This is the big line they’ve been waiting to cross together. 

She smiles at him, touches his bare chest and lets her pinky graze over his nipple teasingly. He hisses and catches her wrist, lifts her hand to his mouth and presses a kiss to the center of it. 

“Hi,” she whispers, suddenly shy. 

He grins at her, presses her palm to his cheek and looks up at her, hopes that she can see how much this means to him—how much _she_ means to him.

“Hi,” he answers back, waiting.

She leans forward, kisses him deeply, and gets her knees on either side of his hips, wraps her fingers around his cock—a rush of pride filling her at his groaned _Fuck, Claire—_and sinks down onto him, grunting and gasping at the feel of him inside her. There’s a beat of silence as they both take the moment in—that they’ve finally gotten here—and then it’s bare skin and slick, wet heat and tight pressure. He’s _inside_ of her, thrusting up into her as she rides him, her fingernails dig into his chest deep enough that little crescent marks are left on his collarbone. It’s a mark he’ll bear proudly. 

There’s no more time for talking, no time for declarations or questions, just the sounds of their bodies moving together. 

She doubles over, gasps his name and drops her forehead to his shoulder, teething sinking into his skin there when he grabs her hips and pushes upwards, hitting a spot inside of her that makes her quiver and see stars. 

“Right there,” she encourages him, clenching around him and matching her rocking motions to his, begging him to do it again.

“Christ, Claire,” he pants, eyes hooded and wild and focused completely on her. “_Fuck_.” 

She’s never been one for babbling, doesn’t believe in faking some noises and groans like a porn star if she isn’t having a good time, but Brad’s hands on her body, his cock inside her, the sharp pleasure-pain sensation of him reaching up to tug and twist at her nipple or to suck it into his mouth, teeth grazing over the sensitive skin and leaving purple-red marks there, has her writhing atop him, clenching at him inside of her, racing towards the finish line where pleasure and boneless bliss awaits here. 

She takes his hand off her hip and places it on her breast and he groans, squeezes. 

“What do you want? What do you need?” He asks, barely restraining himself from flipping her under him and driving into her over and over again until they’re both shaking. He’ll save that for next time because tonight is about Claire—what she wants and needs. He’s there to give it to her. 

“You,” she gasps. “Just you. _This_. God, Brad. _Brad_.”

And then she reaches between her legs and presses a thumb against her clit, rubbing in tight circles in tandem with the snap of her hips down onto his cock and his matching thrust up into her. The sight of her hands on herself makes his mouth water and he slips his hand beneath hers, bats it out of the way, and takes care of her himself. She’s unbearably wet and sensitive and the first touch of his fingers to her is like gasoline on a fire.

It doesn’t take much, just a few slick strokes of his callus-roughened thumb against her clit, for her to come with his name on her lips and her hand clutching at his wrist. The sight of Claire coming undone on his cock and fingers is enough to push him just over the edge, too.

“Gonna come,” he gasps, tries to push her off and slip away to empty himself into the cup of his hand. In his wildest dreams he’d never thought this would happen and he hadn’t thought about condoms, hadn’t thought they’d be needed. 

But she kisses him, clutches at his hips and sinks down deeper onto him. “On birth control,” she tells him, mouth working its way over his mouth and the underside of his jaw and the place behind his ear that makes him go boneless and weak. 

When he empties himself inside of her with a muffled groan, his face buried against her shoulder, everything is hot and slick and _Claire_ and perfect.

Afterwards, when they’re sweaty and out of breath and she’s resting on top of him, she tries to move off of him, but he holds her tighter. 

“Brad,” she protests, palms on his chest. “I’m gonna squish you.”

“Not gonna squish me, Claire,” he rumbles. “Just stay put, kay?” He sounds lax and sleepy, like the only thing he wants to do is stay in this tent with her weight atop him forever.

Claire presses absentminded kisses to his bare chest, nuzzles against the coarse hair and slides her fingers into it, nails scratching there. It felt good to be with him—better than good. _Perfect._ It’s not a word she uses lightly, but it seems applicable here. 

“We gonna talk about this?” she asks tentatively, mind already whirring a million miles an hour considering the consequences of their actions, the next steps, what this all means. 

He’d said he wanted her, but what did he _mean?_ Sometimes it felt like their lives were moving in opposite directions, only barely tethered together. There’s a world of difference between a hookup—_wanting_ someone—and being attracted to someone compared to making an honest to god attempt at a relationship. 

“Yeah,” he tells her, already dozing softly. “In the morning.” He gathers her closer, lifts the sleeping bag over their cooling, naked bodies, and zips them in together. “Sleep,” he tells her, lips pressing another half dozen kisses to the top of her head, like he can’t or won’t stop touching her.

It makes her feel warm and wanted and for once, she tells the voices in her head to be quiet as she slips a leg between Brad’s, curls herself against him, and lets the gentle _thud_ _thud thud_ of his heart lull her to sleep. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> one last chap to go! thanks for sticking with me through this so far!


	8. Chapter 8

When she wakes, it is not to sunlight streaming in or the smell of freshly brewed coffee that she has become so accustomed to over the last few mornings. Instead, she wakes to Brad’s lips on the back of her neck and his hand between her legs, thick fingers sliding between her folds and dragging wetness up to her clit. 

“Brad,” she gasps, clutching at his wrist and pushing her hips back into his. At the feel of him, hard and twitching against the small of her back, drops of fluid smearing across her back, she groans and tries to reach for him, to wrap her hand around him and give him the same pleasure he’s giving her. 

At home, it normally takes her a few minutes to wake up, to mentally brace and prepare for the day. The iced coffee and breakfast help to wake her, as well. But Brad is a shot of espresso to her system, all instant energy and wide awake alertness. 

“Morning,” he rumbles against her ear, teeth nipping at soft flesh there before laying a trail of open-mouthed, damp kisses across her neck and shoulder. She lifts her leg, spreads her thighs for him, and gives him better access to the place where she wants him most. 

He teases her with a finger at her opening, dipping in shallowly and curling the tips of his finger until she’s clutching at him. “Stop teasing,” she tells him with a frown, anxious and desperate in a way that she doesn’t like. She just wants him, doesn’t want the teasing or the games. 

When he removes his fingers from inside her, he sucks them into his mouth, deliberately and confidently, making sure she watches his every movement. Her brown eyes turn dark and focused as he cleans his fingers of the taste of her. 

She thinks about how to best speed things up, how to get what she wants: him, inside her, now. But he doesn’t seem to be in any hurry. He hooks his slick, now-clean fingers under her chin and lifts her mouth to his for a kiss. She opens her mouth beneath his willingly and groans at the taste of her on his tongue, whimpers and tries to twist in his arms and press herself closer, wants to get him on top of her and inside her, wants to feel his weight pressing down on her.

But she doesn’t need to vocalize what she wants and needs. He already knows. 

“C’mere,” he groans against her mouth, rolling her beneath him and hitching a leg over her hip.

When he slides inside of her, all heat and pressure and pleasure, all thoughts of talking—about them, about their future, about what this means—leaves her mind. 

It’s the best way she’s woken up in a long time.

_____________________________

There are certain skills that Claire prides herself on: organization, precision, planning, and preparedness. It’s what makes her an excellent academic, baker, and chef. Knowing the causes and effects of every action prepares her to achieve her goals. 

But fucking Brad Leone in a tent on a whimsical camping weekend is an action for which she has no idea what the consequences may be. He’d kissed her like she meant everything to him, had groaned into her skin that he wanted her, had touched her like she was something precious. But they hadn’t talked since he’d fucked her this morning, since he’d covered every inch of her body with his and told her how beautiful she was. 

The uncertainty of where they stand sinks and settles beneath her skin and it starts to itch and grate at her nerves. 

Because they need to go home today, away from the isolation of the campgrounds and the intimacy of a shared tenet. Today, they go back to their lives and their responsibilities. 

And Claire has no idea what they do after that. 

To make matters worse, Brad is breaking down their campsite, bobbing his head to the Springsteen blaring from the speakers, and shooting her lascivious grins. He drops soft kisses to her forehead, to her mouth, to her cheek, to any part of her as he walks back and forth from one side of the campgrounds to the truck, loading up their tubs and supplies and tent. 

It feels domestic and casual and _soft_ in a way she hadn’t been prepared for and it makes her _ache_ for something that she had long thought maybe she just wasn’t meant to have. The thought of asking him if he’s offering it to her—stability, love, a partner—is terrifying. 

“Claire!”

The sound of him calling out to her from the cab of the truck startles her out of her spiraling thoughts and she can’t help the grin that stretches across her face at the sight of him: sunglasses on and leaning out the window of the truck cab like an overeager, oversized labrador. 

“Let’s go, Saffitz!”

Claire slips her sunglasses on and takes one final look at the now-abandoned, cleared campground, takes in a last deep breath of the fresh mountain air and closes her eyes, committing every sensation to memory. If this is all she gets: one perfect weekend, she wants to remember everything about it. 

The blare of the truck’s horn and Brad’s loud, booming, “Claire! C’mon! We gotta go!” makes her sigh and roll her eyes. Some things never change, even if everything has. 

When she climbs into the cab of the truck beside him, he beams at her, hands her his phone. “You’re in charge of the tunes, okay? You want me to stop for coffee or anything on the way home?”

She shakes her head, smiling softly and taking the phone from him. “I think I’ll survive until we get back to the city.”

Scrolling past the _Love Songs of the 80s_ playlist, she settles on _Road Trip Sing-a-longs _and watches from the corner of her eye as Brad hoots and hollers, drums his fingers on the steering wheel to Queen. 

“Okay, Claire, I’ll take the main vocals, you got the back-up opera-y singer guys, right? Okay, here we go!”

The truck rumbles back towards the city, sun bright and streaming through the windows, music blaring, when Brad reaches over the center console and slips his hand into hers, squeezing softly and thumb brushing over her knuckles. 

It’s almost enough to drown out the uncertainties and questions in the back of her mind. 

____________________

It’s the early hours of the afternoon when Brad parks his truck outside Claire’s building and hops out, running to the back of the truck and slinging her bags over his shoulder. She rolls her eyes at him. “Brad, you don’t have to—I can get them, oh. Okay. You got it.”

They walk side-by-side up to her apartment, but something feels _off._ They’re out of sync, awkwardly exchanging small talk. Her bags hit the doorframe and it sends him careening into her, pushing her against the hallway wall. 

“Shit, shit, sorry, Claire. Geez, maybe we did need to stop for some caffeine on the way home, huh?”

She rubs her shoulder and tells him not to worry about it, tries to keep her breathing steady and her panic low. Those uncertainties, those questions about their relationship, are all roaring back to life and she can’t ignore them any longer. It all feels like the universe is throwing her a sign about her and Brad. 

The door to her apartment swings open easily and he follows in after her, drops her bags by the door and stuffs his hands in his pockets, looking unsure. 

“Should I go or…?”

The question should be an easy one: Does she want him to stay or go? Her instinct is _stay_. But she doesn’t _know._ Is that what he wants? Is this a trick question? Christ, she’d rather go through Harvard finals. 

But it’s been a few moments of silence and indecision too long and Brad’s easy smile has disappeared, replaced by a small frown, his blue eyes searching her face for _something._ She doesn’t know how to verbalize everything she’s feeling and she just needs a_ minute_ to catch her heart and brain up on the same page and—

The gentle, casual kiss he drops on the corner of her mouth in goodbye is too much and she closes her eyes against the rush of feeling. She tenses beneath his touch as everything seems to kickstart, brain and heart finally aligned. 

“Claire?”

He slides his hand around her waist like it belongs there and she can’t take it without talking about this.

“What are we doing?” 

It comes out in a rushed, high-pitched panicky way and she can feel how wide her eyes are as she settles her hands on his forearms, looking up at him. 

“I mean if you want a biology lesson, I’m sure I could help you out,” he teases, ducking his head for a kiss. 

But she pulls away, steps back and crosses her arms over her chest. “Brad, I’m serious.” She runs a hand through her hair in frustration. “Look, I know it’s not, like, _cool_ to label things anymore, but I’m a label girl.”

He raises an eyebrow and agrees, affectionately, “Yeah, I know.”

But it’s like she’s too wrapped up in her own head and she doesn’t hear him. “I need to know what this is and if it was just a one-time thing or if it’s just casual, like you want a friends with benefits thing? Or, or—“

The fight seems to go out of her, unable to finish the last, wishful thoughts of what she hoped this all meant. Finally, the voices of doubt and uncertainty are quiet, finally out in the world. 

He raises an eyebrow at her, takes her panic in stride as he always does, remaining calm. “Labels?”

“Yes.” 

“Okay, okay, I see how it is, Claire. Okay.” And then, like she can see the lightbulb above his head light up, he claps his hands together, completely unfazed in the face of her doubts, and grins. “I got it.” 

He blows past her into her pristinely organized kitchen, rummaging through drawers and muttering to himself under his breath. For a moment, the sight of Brad in her favorite, most sacred place in the world makes her breath catch. Every inch of him fills the kitchen and her stomach clenches in _want._

Kitchen drawers, however, are flying open as he searches for something. 

“Brad, what are you—“

“Bah! Here we go.”

He pulls a roll of bright green masking tape and a Sharpie from a kitchen drawer. She recognizes the tape that she normally uses for labeling containers, homemade extracts, and sauces. She frowns in confusion. 

“Brad….”

He holds up a finger, silencing her, before scribbling something onto the tape and ripping the piece off with his teeth, pushing the sticky tape to his forehead. Beaming, he turns to her, fingers pointed at the bright green tape. 

“There. Labeled.”

She steps forward, squinting, trying to read what he’s written. And then she sees it. There, in his scratchy writing is a single word: _Claire’s_.

She bites her lip, laughs, and reaches up with trembling fingers to trace her name on his forehead. 

“Yeah?”

“Claire,” he says in that soft, patient voice of his, the one he uses in the kitchen on day three of a Gourmet Makes shoot. The voice that soothes every frayed nerve she has. Big hands slide around her waist and pulls her closer. He drops a kiss to the top of her head, the tip of her nose, her cheek, and then her mouth—gentle, soft. She’s helpless to do anything else but respond, to push up on her toes and kiss him back, fisting his shirt in her hands. 

He breaks the kiss, presses their foreheads together. “Claire, you gotta know. This isn’t causal for me. Nothing about the way I feel about you is casual.” 

She feels tears sting at her eyes. He looks panicked at the sight of tears and he cups her face, looking concerned. “Shit, is that not—Is that not how you feel? Shit, Claire, I’m sorry, I—“

But she kisses him, stops whatever it is he’s trying to apologize for because her heart is pounding in her chest and her stomach is filled with bubbling happiness masquerading as butterflies and all she wants is Brad Leone. 

“Me, too,” she gasps against his mouth, getting every other word out between soft, searching kisses. “Me, too.”

It turns out, this is the last step in Brad Leone’s Patented Relaxation Plan. 

(One year later, he gifts her that piece of tape for their first anniversary, perfectly framed with a note at the bottom that says ‘Property of Claire Saffitz.’ They hang it up in their bedroom before they head out to the campgrounds for the weekend. 

They only bring one tent.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and that's all folks! i hope you liked it!


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